loewenstein just made my day...
A while back I said somewhere (I can't remember where but it was a couple months back) that the insurgency is (also) a bunch of murdering bastards and that they are not the way to rid Iraq of the occupation. All they could possibly achieve is the justification for years of Yankee presence.
I argued that the Iraqi people could have the occupation forces out of there within a matter of weeks if they mounted an effective campaign of peaceful people power. And it looks like that's exactly what is now starting to happen.
Loewenstein? Well, his article was the heads-up for a really wonderful piece of news
in the Guardian today.
And it just got better. You could be forgiven for thinking that the organisers of the mainly Shia demonstration of 300,000 have been avidly reading this blog. They told the demonstrators not to fire any shots and not to return fire if fired upon. This is exactly the kind of discipline needed to pull off a peaceful people power coup. Absolutely no violence irrespective of the provocation. Yo dudes! Proud of you! And of course it goes without saying that they have taken up my great invocation: YANKEE GO HOME !!!
If the Iraqis can crank this up to a massive size, if they can keep it peaceful, if they can passively immobilise the Yank troops with peaceful people power, with the world's media there to report on the American response, the Yanks would be stuffed like a thanksgiving turkey.
Gobblegobblegobbledemocracygobblegobblegobble...
Photos here.
P.S. Has this been covered by the mainstream media here in Australia? I haven't noticed it. And it happened four days ago. That's some media blackout...
I argued that the Iraqi people could have the occupation forces out of there within a matter of weeks if they mounted an effective campaign of peaceful people power. And it looks like that's exactly what is now starting to happen.
Loewenstein? Well, his article was the heads-up for a really wonderful piece of news
in the Guardian today.
And it just got better. You could be forgiven for thinking that the organisers of the mainly Shia demonstration of 300,000 have been avidly reading this blog. They told the demonstrators not to fire any shots and not to return fire if fired upon. This is exactly the kind of discipline needed to pull off a peaceful people power coup. Absolutely no violence irrespective of the provocation. Yo dudes! Proud of you! And of course it goes without saying that they have taken up my great invocation: YANKEE GO HOME !!!
If the Iraqis can crank this up to a massive size, if they can keep it peaceful, if they can passively immobilise the Yank troops with peaceful people power, with the world's media there to report on the American response, the Yanks would be stuffed like a thanksgiving turkey.
Gobblegobblegobbledemocracygobblegobblegobble...
Photos here.
P.S. Has this been covered by the mainstream media here in Australia? I haven't noticed it. And it happened four days ago. That's some media blackout...
posted by The Editor at
6:34 PM
3 Comments:
comrade jr, a problem with my argument? Never! :-)
Ok, I didn't make myself clear enough. I'm saying this: If the Iraqi resistance can stage massive peaceful people power protests, and hopefully not just massive but also extending over a protracted period, demanding the occupation ends, and virtually choking the occupation forces' movements, as long as it's utterly peaceful and sufficient numbers (like thousands) of camcorders are present to record any attrocities committed by the occupiers against the protesters, and factoring in that there will always be enough media there, eg Guardian, BBC, al-Jazeera, freelanceers, etc, the occupation forces would not dare try anything stupid and if they did it would hit the media, via the alternatives first if necessary, but if it (said attrocity) is big enough, the mainstram would have to pick it up. and if the protests didn't meet with brutality which could be exploited in the media, just the sheer size of the protests, the duration, and the clear message, would eventually HAVE to be picked up by the mainstream meadia.
Are you happier now?
"I think you need to balance this argument against the obvious truth that the reason the Americans are bogged down in Iraq is because of guerilla warfare"
I could equally argue that all that was ever required was massive peaceful people power and passive resitance to hamstring and eject the occupiers. In fact I could argue that if it had gone that way, all the embedded media would have been able to report was that the occupiers have been met daily by massive, peaceful protests demanding they leave now. What would have been there to shot at? What would their bombers have done? What would their gunships have done? Falluja and Najaf etc would not be have been trashed and if they were, the world would ask "why?".
You would have had a huge army being embarrassed daily by huge crowds shouting GO HOME NOW! In such a scenario, with their embedded media, the army woud have been checkmated. The images of such protests would have inspired massive and continuing global protests and the Yanks would have been utterly fucked. They would have had no option but to cut and run. Their argument for "liberation" would have looked pretty sick if there had been no one to "protect" the Iraqis from, and if the masses had demanded, and continued to demand, in a mssive show of solidarity and strength, that they fuck off.
That was the possibility that was never explored back then. But it looks like they're experimenting with it now.
Gandhi chucked the British Empire out of India with peaceful people power. What better example do you need? I'm sick of this crap that only violence is effective or that it's essential for a victory. It's flawed and it results in a massive death toll and massive damage to infrastructure. Both of which hurt the occupied country more than the aggressor.
I think your "obvious truth" is nothing of the sort if we factor in possible alternatives which could have been tried but weren't.
comrade jr, I suspect you have been brainwashed into thinking that armed struggle is essential. Not only do I disagree, but if you insist in continuing to peddle this rhetoric of death and destruction here (this is a pacifist blog), the time will soon come when your comments will no longer be welcome here. I don't need that shit here. Understood?
I believe it would be more effective than any armed resistance if the Iraqis just sat quietly and waited for all of the US running around and waving guns to suddenly look as stupid as it truely is.
But Iraqis are just people, not so very different from any others and it is unrealistic to think they could collectively leap to the insight that peaceful resistance would embarass the heck out of the US.
Since Bush league only sent half or less of the number of soldiers needed to do the job rummy intended to do, they will never accomplish anything as it stands; it will be an unending "rear guard" action and blood shed can continue until bush is defeated.
Greensmile, yes, it would be unrealistic. But before Gandhi pulled off his thing, everyone was telling HIM he was being unrealsitic to expect the British Empire to just pull up stumps and go home. But that's what they did. I'm not saying I'm a Gandhi. All I'm trying to do is to keep putting the idea about that passive resistance can be an awsome force if it is well organised. I gues I'm sort of working on the idea that if it's said often enough by enough people it'll hit critical mass and explode. I'm just a little spark hoping to start a forest fire... :-)
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